The control of pleasure

How could it fail to fascinate us? The United States has powerful resources with which to excite our envy and enchant our hearts and minds. In political terms, it has the amiable countenance of an old and accommodating democracy, heir to a revolution of universal significance and a rich culture. For millions of oppressed people all over the world, its famous symbol - Liberty lighting the world - still represents a powerful message of hope and the promise of a better life.

After emerging victorious from the cold war, the US went on to win the war in the Gulf and then in Kosovo, upholding humanitarian principles and countering authoritarian regimes or evil dictatorships on each occasion. Having reached this peak of military glory as the only remaining “hyperpower”, it coolly dominates the world like no other country in history.

What is more, the length of the current US cycle of growth seems to confirm that God really is on America’s side. Did it not invent the internet and launch the new economy? Is it not the driving force behind globalisation?

All over the world, people are following its example, adopting the latest management methods, legal systems, sales techniques, spin doctors and, of course, its fashions, stars and myths. US firms in every field - from Microsoft to Yahoo, Walt Disney or Monsanto - flaunt their intriguing success and continue their world conquest, backed by clever advertising campaigns.

But whatever its admirers may think, it is hardly surprising that here and there, and above all in America itself (as we saw in Seattle last December and in Washington this April), people should be wondering about the meaning of this offensive. About the new face of the US empire. The power of its ideology. And its strategies of persuasion.

by Ignacio Ramonet

It is easier to dominate someone if they are unaware of being dominated. Colonised and colonisers both know that domination is not just based on physical supremacy. Control of hearts and minds follows military conquest. Which is why any empire that wants to last must capture the souls of its subjects.

In the past the United States has been involved in genocide (of American Indians), enslavement (of African Americans), territorial expansion (into Mexico) and colonial conquest (of Puerto Rico). But now, tired of its past brutality, it seeks to occupy the minds of non-Americans peacefully and win their hearts.

Oddly enough, it is in Europe that this imperial design meets the least resistance, for reasons that are, above all, political. The first democratic revolution brought the US into existence, in 1776, 13 years before the French revolution. There are also historical reasons. No European state - except Britain in the 18th century and Spain at the end of the 19th century - has waged war against the US in a two-sided dispute. On the contrary, the US has long been a land of freedom, generously welcoming millions of European refugees and political exiles. What is more it stood by Europe in two world wars (1914-18 and 1939-45) and has, on various occasions, played a decisive role in interventions against war-mongering or fascist powers.

In 1989-91 the US won the cold war against the Soviet Union, bringing down the Berlin wall and heralding the emergence of democratic regimes in central and eastern Europe.

In geopolitical terms the US occupies a position of power that no other country has ever enjoyed. Its military force is overwhelming, on account of its nuclear weaponry and control of space, but also its naval power. It is the only country to operate fleets on all the world’s oceans and its main seas, and to have military bases, depots and listening posts on all five continents.

The Pentagon spends about $31bn on military research alone, a sum equivalent to the entire budget of the French army. Its armament is several generations ahead of the competition. Its armed forces (1.4 million soldiers) can identify, monitor and listen to objects, in the air, below ground or underwater. The US military can see almost everything, without being seen or threatened, and destroy targets, by day or night, with extreme precision (1).

Washington also has an impressive range of intelligence agencies - the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency, National Reconnaissance Office and Defence Intelligence Agency - that employ over 100,000 people, with a budget of more than $26m. US spies are at work everywhere, all the time, in friendly and hostile countries. Not only do they steal diplomatic and military secrets but also industrial, technological and scientific data.

In foreign affairs, the US “hyperpower” directs international policy. It keeps an eye on crises all over the world, for it has interests everywhere and is the only country to act globally, from the Middle East to Kosovo, in Timor and Taiwan, Pakistan and the Caucasus, Congo and Angola, Cuba and Colombia.

Washington also exerts a decisive influence in the multilateral bodies whose decisions set the course of world affairs: the United Nations, Group of Seven (major industrialised countries), International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organisation, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and so on.

In the modern world the strength of an empire no longer depends exclusively on its military and diplomatic clout; and the US has also secured a dominant position in science. Every year it drains tens of thousands of brains (students, researchers and graduates) from the rest of the world into its universities, laboratories and companies. In the last 10 years this has enabled it to win 19 Nobel prizes for physics (out of 26), 17 in medicine (out of 24) and 13 in chemistry (out of 22).

US control of economic networks is not open to question. Its gross domestic product in 1999 ($8,683.4bn) was over six times the French equivalent. The dollar is still the top currency. It is involved in 83% of all exchange transactions (2). The New York stock exchange is the universal financial barometer, and its hiccups send ripples round the world, as we saw with the Nasdaq index in April. US pension funds - the behemoths of the financial markets - intimidate executives in every sphere of global business.

The US is also the leading cyberpower. It controls technological innovation and the computer industry. This is the land of the Web, the information highway and the new economy, home of computer giants, such as Microsoft, Intel and IBM, and Internet champions, such as Yahoo, Amazon and America Online.

Why then does such crushing military, diplomatic, economic and technologic supremacy not prompt more criticism or resistance? No doubt because US hegemony also embraces culture and ideology. It has long been the home of many fine, universally respected intellectuals and creative artists in every field, who are quite rightly admired by one and all. Its mastery extends to the symbolic level, lending it what Max Weber calls “charismatic domination”.

The US has taken control of the vocabulary, concepts and meaning of many fields. It obliges us to formulate problems of its own invention with the words it offers. It provides the codes to decipher enigmas it created in the first place. In fact, it has set up any number of research centres and think-tanks for this very purpose, employing thousands of analysts and experts. These eminent bodies produce reports on legal, social and economic issues with a perspective that supports the ideal of the free market, the world of business and the global economy. Their lavishly funded work attracts endless media attention and is broadcast the world over (3).

The main factories of this industry of persuasion - the Manhattan Institute, Brookings Institution, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute and Cato Institute - spare no expense in inviting large numbers of journalists, academics, civil servants and company directors to their seminars and conferences, so that they may return home and spread the word.

Wielding the might of information and technology, the US thus establishes, with the passive complicity of the people it dominates, what may be seen as affable oppression or delightful despotism. And this is all the more effective as its control of the culture industries lets it capture our imagination.

The US uses its admirable know-how to people our dreams with crowds of media heroes, Trojan horses despatched by their master to invade our brains. Only 1% of the films shown in the US are foreign productions, while Hollywood floods the world with its wares. And close behind come television series, cartoons, videos and comics, not to mention fashion, urban development and food (see article by Rick Fantasia in this issue).

The faithful gather to worship the new icons in malls - temples raised to the glory of all forms of consumption. All over the world these centres of shopping fever promote the same way of life, in a whirl of logos, stars, songs, idols, brands, gadgets, posters and celebrations (like the extraordinary spread of Halloween in France).

All this is accompanied by the seductive rhetoric of freedom of choice and consumer liberty, hammered home by obsessive, omnipresent advertising (annual advertising expenditure in the US exceeds $200bn) that has as much to do with symbols as with the goods themselves. Marketing has become so sophisticated that it aims to sell not just a brandname or social sign, but an identity. All based on the principle that having is being.

It is high time that we recall Aldous Huxley’s warning that, “As the art and science of manipulation come to be better understood, the dictators of the future will doubtless learn to combine these techniques with the non-stop distractions which, in the West, are now threatening to drown in a sea of irrelevance the rational propaganda essential to the maintenance of individual liberty and the survival of democratic institutions” (4).

The American empire has become a master of symbols and seduction. Offering unlimited leisure and endless distraction, its hypnotic charm enters our minds and instils ideas that were not ours. America no longer seeks our submission by force, but by incantation. It has no need to issue orders, for we have given our consent. No need for threats, as it bets on our thirst for pleasure.